The Light Today

Air thick with humidity.
Sun hazy but blinding still in its glare.
Today holds ease in its harsh light.

Ease in that we best not rush,
the heat will overwhelm.
Move slowly—unlike everything we ever hear
in our human to human exchanges.
Walk carefully, pause in the shade
so that you might drink in the beauty of this day.

Move too fast and the […]

By |2022-07-06T06:10:42-05:00July 6, 2022|Wild Poems|

Seeds

It doesn’t matter how many decades I’ve been doing it.
Every single year, when I plant vegetable seeds
the size of a pin head into soil
I am mesmerized and astonished when they sprout.

Some are tenderly nursed along indoors
establishing some roots before they are set in the garden-
exposed, then, to elements
that both hinder and encourage their growth.

Others, when […]

By |2023-10-25T18:08:59-05:00June 7, 2022|Wild Poems|

An orchard full of questions

An orchard full of questions

In grasping for answers
–when we hold too tight–
we squeeze the juice right out of the question.

In search of definitive, black and white certainty
we unwittingly plot a rigid path that narrows with each step.
It’s hard not to dig in, once we’ve begun.
To press on, unyielding in our quest for certitude,
no longer noticing […]

By |2022-04-29T06:46:51-05:00April 29, 2022|Wild Poems|

Mud and Muted Miracles

Mud and Muted Miracles

I’ll be honest.
April is not my favorite month.
The snow is either gone
or too crunchy or punchy to play with.
The ground is still frozen
so garden prep can’t really happen.

It’s a time of in between
known here in the northland
as Mud Season.
Some years are more dramatic than others
but we experience mud ponds
(far too expansive to […]

By |2022-04-04T10:52:23-05:00April 4, 2022|Wild Poems|

What does it mean to pray?

What does it mean to pray?

What does it mean to pray?
Gathered together or on our own?
For some, it’s a direct line to a creator.
For others, it’s more of a universe thing,
tapping into a connection, say, with the natural world and ‘sending’ it.
For still others, it’s about focused energy and light—
beaming it outward.

For some, prayer is […]

By |2022-03-09T08:05:01-06:00March 9, 2022|Wild Poems|

A Winter Walk

A Winter Walk

Ah, Winter, you often maligned
sometimes scowled at beauty of a season.

I get it. If people are only shoveling
or driving upon slippery roads,
some of your shine can wear off pretty quickly.

Dear reader,
if you are someone lacking either the gear or the gumption
to go outside in subzero temps,
allow me to elaborate just a little…

For starters, there […]

By |2022-01-31T06:34:55-06:00January 31, 2022|Wild Poems|

Seeing Solstice

There is a pause now
this quiet Solstice time
before light slowly lengthens.

The temptation?
To count the days.
To hold our breath
until daylight stretches into evening
and early morning forces back the darkness.

What a relief it will be
these light-starved eyes
to see again
no longer fumbling in darkness.

Still,
somewhere deep inside
past resistance and reason
you know this darkness, too, is your home.

A place you […]

By |2023-10-25T17:56:29-05:00December 15, 2021|Wild Poems|

For All

Thanksgiving greetings to all of you from The Wild Institute.  As I considered posting the annual Thanksgiving Wild Thought, I found myself pausing, not quite able to just post it as we enter into our 2nd Thanksgiving with Covid19 still so prevalently in our midst.

My wish for you, whether you are gathering […]

By |2021-11-22T13:42:52-06:00November 22, 2021|Wild Poems|

Breathing Fire

The maples steal my breath
with glowing leaves the colors of fire.
Likewise the birch
golden against deep blue sky.

Walk among them now
on a crisp sunny day.
Inhale the shades of red, yellow, and orange
until, in your exhale, you could almost breathe fire
from the glory of the colors and scents of autumn.

We could be this—
such lovers of trees and […]

By |2021-11-02T06:38:57-05:00November 2, 2021|Wild Poems|

Re-Wilding

“Hope is the thing with feathers,”
so says Emily Dickinson.

“When despair for the world grows in me
I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and
I come into the peace of wild things.”
Borrowed, of course, from Wendell Berry.

When we need propping up
after, or maybe sometimes before, we topple,
it is […]

By |2021-09-22T10:06:04-05:00September 22, 2021|Wild Poems|
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